Friday, December 17, 2010

That's how it looked the day I purchased it. I had already removed the quill stem with flat bars -and obviuous retrofit-  the cheap straight seat-post -no saddle though- and the wheels. We'll talk later about the wheels
As can easily be seen the paint job is quite damaged (better don't have a look at the other side) and the decals are made from a frail thin sheet clearly unfit for reuse
At first glance it seems rather a forlorn sight but after some restoration work I hope that "la tua (sua) salute rifiorirà". And yes I like Opera.

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Quill Stem

I've recently acquired a third-hand rusty bike to restore. It seems to be a mid quality steel frame labelled TITAN assembled with BH original parts. Is TITAN somehow related to BH? Still don't know but what remains of the original drive train is BH and the lugs seem to be BH too
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Anyway let's start with the quill-stem. As you can see it's a single cast aluminium piece  shaped as those old two-piece lugged steel stems from the fifties and sixties. The quill measures 8 cm, the stem 15 cm and the angle shows a neutral 75º. The bar clamp is 25mm securing the bars by means of a single 11mm hex bolt (with a cunning built in lip-groove  to prevent untightening), the expander  is conic not wedged so, after these considerations, I'd dare to date it as a circa 1960-70 stem. The letters BF (not BH) are clearly stamped in both sides of the quill so it must be of French origin.
It has obviously lived a hard life attending to the many scratches unveiled by the clean up (used a mild degreaser). That's how it looks after some water-sanding.